


Nightmares

by One_Chicago_Fanfiction



Category: Chicago PD
Genre: Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, PTSD, halzek - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-15
Updated: 2020-05-15
Packaged: 2021-03-03 03:36:18
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,196
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24198334
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/One_Chicago_Fanfiction/pseuds/One_Chicago_Fanfiction
Summary: Sometimes, Jay has nightmares he doesn't know how to come back from. Sometimes, Adam is there to help.
Relationships: Jay Halstead/Adam Ruzek
Comments: 4
Kudos: 70





	Nightmares

Sometimes, by the time he woke, the nightmares were already gone. Sometimes, in the pale morning light slipping in through the blinds, they were nothing more than an aftertaste, bitter ashes at the back of his throat. Sometimes he could swallow hard against them and chase them away before the day had even begun. He’d remember the feeling of them—the panic, the rising terror in his heart—but not the images. He could pull himself out of bed, stand in the shower beneath the nearly scalding water and let the heat of it ease the tension from his shoulders completely. Sometimes he woke up and it was time for work. He could jerk his body into motion, let muscle memory and simple morning routine pull him through. 

Sometimes there were no nightmares whatsoever—dreamless sleep and comfortable blackness. And other times they felt so impossibly tangible, like he could reach inside his own mind and hold his nightmares in his very hands. 

It was always worse when he woke in the night. He’d jerk awake with a start, hands curled into fists and breath tangled up in his throat, the yawning darkness of the bedroom all around him. And he was alone. Regardless of the second heartbeat in the room, the gentle sounds of even breathing beside him. He couldn’t recall the images he’d dreamed, just the sickly sense of dread pooling cold and merciless in his stomach, the feeling of swallowing back bile. 

Already sitting upright, Jay swung his legs out of the bed, pressed bare feet against the cool laminate floor, and simply breathed. Slow breaths in, long shaky exhales. He scrubbed the heels of his hands down his face, ran his trembling fingers through his hair and focussed on the barest sliver of light beneath the bedroom door—a streetlight shining in from the window in the hall. Snippets of the dream ghosted through his mind—blood on his hands, bodies piled up in a basement. He felt it coming, the moment it all came careening back—the part of the night where he spiralled back into his nightmares while still awake.

Someone pressed a gun against his back. His whole body jerked from the fright. Fear like acid in his stomach. 

But it wasn’t a gun, wasn’t a killer in the darkness behind him. It was warm fingers, gentle against his shoulder, pulling back quickly with his reaction. 

“Woah,” came a voice, worried and soothing and grounding—familiar. “You okay?” Jay looked over his shoulder, though he could barely stand to witness the sight. 

It was Adam. Adam in the darkness, propped up on his elbow, looking at Jay, tired and desperate, as if he’d find physical wounds if he looked closely enough, straining to see him through the darkness. 

“Yeah,” Jay breathed—lied. He turned away, looked down at the floor, and altered his answer just a little. “I’ll be fine.”

“Jay,” Adam said, shifting closer to him across the bed. Jay just sat there and listened, listened to the smooth sounds of the sheets beneath Adam’s body as he moved, the creaking of the bed frame as he pulled himself upright, as he lingered there behind him, neither touching Jay nor giving him much space. Jay felt Adam’s breath on his shoulder, and at last Adam spoke again. “Can I hug you?”

And Jay almost laughed, a weak smile tugging at his lips. Adam was too much, too good, almost childlike in his worry, his steadfast affection, the way he asked permission this time. Part of Jay wanted to say no, wanted to force himself onto his feet and out of this bedroom, into his running gear and out onto the well lit streets of his city. Their city. It wasn’t about outrunning any demons. It was about replacing one type of adrenaline with another, using his body to remind himself he was strong. But the truth was—sometimes he wasn’t strong. And sometimes, when he was alone, that truth crushed the breath right out of him. But with Adam? 

With Adam, it felt like the opposite of strong wasn’t necessarily weak. With Adam, the opposite of strong was simply—human.  
“Yeah,” Jay said softly, fighting the urge to add please on the end, despite how desperate he suddenly was to feel Adam’s touch against him. 

Adam wrapped his arms around Jay from behind, arms around his chest, face pressed against the point between Jay’s neck and his shoulder. 

“It’s okay, baby,” Adam whispered, and a warm and pleasant shiver rolled through Jay with the feeling of Adam’s breath on his skin. “You wanna talk about it?”

“No,” Jay said, quick but not unkind. He brought a hand up to run his fingers through Adam’s messy hair, thick and out of place. He rubbed circles into Adam’s scalp, soft, gentle, and they were quiet enough in the darkness together that for a moment Jay thought Adam might fall asleep like this, leaning against him, holding him. Adam’s voice pulled him back from that thought. 

“I just wanna make sure you know,” he said, “that if any of that ever changes, I’m right here. Doesn’t matter what you tell me—or if you don’t wanna tell me anything at all. I’ll still be right here. I’m here for you, Jay.”

“I’m here for you too,” Jay said, voice a whisper caught on the threat of tears pressing against his eyes. Adam was too much—more than he’d ever thought he’d have, more than he thought he deserved. Adam was more than Jay had ever dared hope for, and he wanted to be the same in turn, even on nights like this. Even when Jay could barely hold himself together, he wanted to be there to hold Adam up.

“I know you are,” Adam said, lips against Jay’s cheek now, pressing a gentle kiss to his jaw. “Come on. It’s, like, three in the morning. Think you’ll get back to sleep?” 

“I don’t know,” Jay said. “Maybe.” With the fatigue rolling through him, he was certainly willing to try. 

They settled back into the bed together, comfortable and warm, deep under the covers, blankets up over their shoulders, legs tangled under the sheets, foreheads tipped together and fingers entwined tight. 

Jay knew how hard it must have been to share space with him sometimes. Sometimes he woke with a start in the night and Adam couldn’t pull him back to himself, no matter what he promised, no matter what he said. Sometimes, Adam probably felt like a failure, like he wasn’t enough. It was just that sometimes there was no convincing Jay everything was okay. That’s just the way it was with him sometimes. But tonight, as Jay drifted slowly back to sleep, sharing Adam’s warmth and listening to his slow breathing, Jay thought about the simple truth that was him and Adam, and the fact that—for now at least—there was nothing else he wanted. 

The sleep he fell into was dreamless, unbroken, and when morning light pooled into the room and Jay opened his eyes once more, Adam was still there against him. He was still right there.


End file.
